My footprint nearly filled my father’s as I followed him in the frosty woods. The sun was sleeping somewhere beyond the trees that surrounded us, the only sound the soft crunching of our footsteps. The brown leather quiver on my father’s back was filled with three red fletched arrows. He was slightly stooped as he walked, head down, choosing his… Read more →
You go back when you can’t deal. It’s kind of like jail, when you come back, you commit a crime so that you don’t have to face anything. There’re only so many days of polishing the boots you have at your home, while your wife is making excuses to go to The Home Depot. “What do you think I did… Read more →
Postcards Day after I purchase the snake I get a postcard. From my brother Doug. Older by six years. Hey Bro it starts. Doug doesn’t phone or email. Sends postcards. Usually fences. Split-rail fences like out west. Or wide plank fences that keep back horses. All kinds. This latest being a high fence like Tom Sawyer painted. We grew… Read more →
I am dreaming. My new monomania, Kelli from acting class, Virginia slim, long tawny hair, edge-free face – basic nightmare – verbally assaults me in my car, in Brooklyn, my home. Our real-life conversation on the college green is light and guarded but in my dream she dryly attacks my character, delivering her words with stretched vowels and the hard… Read more →
The Liu family didn’t agree on much. Nothing at all really, except my dumplings looked like insects, and they did. No matter how I tried, it didn’t matter. They stayed insects. Small lips with off-sized heads, impoverished bellies, and frail vertebrae threatening to dissolve in liquid-thin containers, but this is where the agreement ended. Each member of my wife’s family… Read more →
At the Middle Country Road underpass, just beyond Smithtown, the swirling snow began to melt as soon as it hit the ground. As the temperature fell, dark patches of ice formed near the edges of the parkway. Moving cars kept the road from freezing, but, as the traffic thinned, fingers of black ice crept toward the center. * * *… Read more →
“Are we ready? Okay, let’s begin.” Miss Grant lifted the arm and placed the needle on the record. A freshly mimeographed worksheet, the page still damp and smelling of purple ink, was in front of me. My pencil ready, the song began. I filled in the lyrics as I listened, “Leaving on a jet plane, don’t know when I’ll be… Read more →
You aimed your silver BMW toward the only open lane at the six-wide toll booth and then handed the old man double the toll. When he took your money, you told him something along the line of wanting to pay for the next car. Maybe you saw headlights in your rearview mirror. Maybe you didn’t. But when the old guy… Read more →
When Father Andrew said the Last Rites over both of us, Nancy tried to stop him. “My husband,” she pleaded, “only my husband Jake is dying. Leave Jonas alone.” But he would not be stopped. We all know. Why pretend? God cannot be fooled. I joked: “I guess now I’m good to go, too.” Charlotte turned away. Nancy looked down. No-one… Read more →
The Muse of Paranoia, rarely seen, is not invisible. Her supplicants are distinguished by stares intent not so much on as beyond their objects of scrutiny: documents fanned in suggestive disarray, dining utensils speckled in rust, unfamiliar hair spooling from a faucet’s damp handle, small talk rendered hieroglyphic on sleepless reflection. The impassive expression of those inspired is broken by… Read more →